


Reflection

by Ariana (Ariana_El)



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Gen, Loneliness, the aftermath of the Darkening
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 09:26:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8096776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ariana_El/pseuds/Ariana
Summary: Arafinwe in his mirror.





	

**Author's Note:**

> We know Arafinwe was the sensible one who stayed behind. Just a thought of what he might have seen in himself.

**Reflection**

_There was still some reason in Finwe’s family,_ they whispered approvingly. There was wisdom and hope among Noldor folk.

He _was_ reasonable. He had the nerve to do what his brothers couldn’t – to turn back and face the consequences of what they had done. He had the decency to bow his head and ask for mercy for the people who came back with him. He was the first one to walk on the bloody shores with his head bare and his heart open, to apologize for unforgivable deeds of Noldor and beg for peace, at least, if anything else.

He was the one who suddenly had to face the responsibility of being the king of the remains of Noldor folk. The Valar looked approvingly at him, he knew that, for they saw no quarrel and no fiery spirit his older brothers had. He was the guarantee of safe and peaceful rule.

And yet, it was not what his mirror said every time he looked at himself. _Coward,_ whispered the crystal surface. He was the one who abandoned his brothers and sister, he was the father who didn’t follow his own children, if only to protect them from the influence other might have had on them. He was the one who followed his brothers and his folk, only to return with pitifully small host. He was the husband who heard his wife asking for their sons and daughter, and he was the one who had to tell her he had left them.

He was not a king within his empty chambers, he didn't _feel_ a king. In the darkness around Valinor he was an orphaned son and a lonely husband, for his wife Earwen left him to live with her father on the empty, grieving shores.

Yet he the elf the Valar wanted him to be, so he tried to carry on in the shadows of once wonderful, now empty and silent city of Tuna. The Noldor needed their king.

 


End file.
